In case there weren't enough Mars + Neptune, the culminating Mars is 20' from sesqui-square my natal Neptune (reinforced by Sun), which will at least be a transit in force on Tuesday. OTOH the foreground Moon is very nicely aspected, even if the aspecting Venus and Jupiter aren't quite foreground themselves.

Other good news is that Mars and Neptune are not in aspect. That is, Mars is angular, Neptune's angular, is there is no Mars-Neptune aspect. That's a different matter altogether.

The really key thing about this is that, although both Mars and Neptune were closely foreground, they were not in aspect. That's a gigantic difference.

The whole effect is that a had a one- or two-day health thing that was symbolically appropriate to Mars angular and Neptune angular and then passed quickly with just a little anxiety about it for a day. I probably also benefited from the close Moon-Jupiter square. There are enough different forms of Neptune in this chart that it's hard to say the foreground, moderate-orbed transiting Moon-Neptune opposition on the one hand, or the non-angular partile Sun transit to natal Neptune on the other hand, was more in play; it feels a little more like the latter since there was some general physical depletion with it.

That (especially the energy depletion), wine, and Marion have been the main features of the fortnight

The really key thing about this is that, although both Mars and Neptune were closely foreground, they were not in aspect. That's a gigantic difference.

Yes, and by your past teachings if the Mars-Neptune had been in partile aspect the 'difference' would have been some kind of Mars-Neptune 'outstanding incident' relative to the goings-on with your immediate environment. Again, one of the most important personal learnings your past teachings has taught me about Return Charts is where you write from your book 'Interpreting Solar Returns:'

It is when angularity and aspect partility coincide that outstanding incidents are most likely to come about.

Yes, I see this as your past standard teachings except for the t Pluto cnj r Mars 0,47. Is this Mars-Pluto aspect the main component of your ‘new theory’ with this SLR???`

I see your SLR as featuring a Sun-Saturn ‘outstanding incident’ along with the headline of Uranus on the MC relative to your immediate environment, with the partile Sun-Saturn 180 falling on the Zenith/Nadir axis of the SLR featuring the angular 'outstanding incident'. I am a little confused about the 'new theory'? Let us know. Its not often we see such dynamics in a SLR.

Jim wrote:The really key thing about this is that, although both Mars and Neptune were closely foreground, they were not in aspect. That's a gigantic difference.

Yes, and by your past teachings if the Mars-Neptune had been in partile aspect the 'difference' would have been some kind of Mars-Neptune 'outstanding incident' relative to the goings-on with your immediate environment. Again, one of the most important personal learnings your past teachings has taught me about Return Charts is where you write from your book 'Interpreting Solar Returns:'

To me, the big deal is that a Mars-Neptune aspect is probably the worst psychological experience in human existence, one of pure terror. Mars and Neptune alone are entirely different - but that third factor, the aspect itself, was absent so there was no terror.

Yes, I see this as your past standard teachings except for the t Pluto cnj r Mars 0,47. Is this Mars-Pluto aspect the main component of your ‘new theory’ with this SLR???`

No (see below for more). This is just observinig that ALL partile transits at the time of the SLR are valid. Fagan said this in all his early writings (you and I have discussed his article on this several times) and Bradley made the point in a late chapter in his book. - I have found that they need to be treated not just as background in the SLR but as "background information" or "fill in the details" in the events themselves: Interpret the return chart using only the foreground factors and then, once the basic tone is established, read the non-foreground partile aspects as "added deatils." (In this case, that transit gave accurate added details about the minor medical matter than the main chart was showing.)

I see your SLR as featuring a Sun-Saturn ‘outstanding incident’ along with the headline of Uranus on the MC relative to your immediate environment, with the partile Sun-Saturn 180 falling on the Zenith/Nadir axis of the SLR featuring the angular 'outstanding incident'. I am a little confused about the 'new theory'? Let us know. Its not often we see such dynamics in a SLR.

To give more details: I've been seriously questioning whether foreground natal planets are valid interpretive elements in solar and lunar returns. I know for sure that transiting planets foreground are of great importance, and that natal planets foreground in the SSR or SLR are keenly sensitive to transits. I just realized that I didn't have enough data to sustain the belief that natal planets angular in a return chart is, by itself, a valid factor.

Taking the above example: Transiting Sun opposes natal Saturn and both exactly square Ascendant. There are three separate factors pssible with this:

But what if #2 isn't a valid consideration? Do we have enough discrimination to tell that three-part possibility from this alternative...?

1. Transiting Sun angular
2. Transiting Sun opposite natal Saturn

Notice the difference: There are two separate factors to interpret and blend, not three. This makes for a different interpretation. It makes it harder (for example) to filter out whether the angular natal Saturn is a distinct factor, since Sun's transit to natal Saturn is so similar.

Under this new theory (for example), my natal Jupiter-Uranus being angular is irrelevant (because the theory is that natal planet angularity is not per se relevant in the return). Similary, my natal Jupiter-Uranus and Mercury-Saturn aspects would not be separate interpretive elements under that theory.

This is only a theory, though. It might be wrong. On the other thread, I just posted one striking example that (taken by itself) might be showing that the theory is wrong. But I want to give it an aggressive testing before settling into a final opinion.

To say it (from the beginning) a little more fully: The approach that Bradley and Duncan, in particular, delivered to me over 40 years ago, which has been "Sidereal standard" for at least that long, is that, in a return chart, all foreground natal and transiting planets and the aspects between and among them are interpretive factors. This breaks down into five separate considerations. ("Aspect" below means conjunction, opposition, or square within about 5°.)

OK Jim, I think I now understand better where you are coming from. I have of course not been exposed to all of Fagan's/Bradley's teaching you have absorbed. Within the last year I have learned from a Fagan AA article he noticed the importance of the faster moving t planets making partile 0,90,180 to natal planets on the day of the SLR, and I have verified this as most important with my limited research. But, I always felt since an outer planet t moved so slow it might not be that important making a partile 0,90,180 in the SLR on the day of the SLR. I know this: t Pluto is approaching a partile 180 to my Natal Mars, and I damn sure don't want to see this transits appear close to an angle in any of my upcoming SLRs---as a possibility for malefic 'outstanding' happenings. With my past, I have noticed Mars-Pluto symbolism manifesting in my life as being absolutely worn out with more physical activity than normal. Indeed, let us know if you see any Mars-Pluto symbolism manifesting in your life with your SLR. Thanks.

OK Jim, I think I now understand better where you are coming from. I have of course not been exposed to all of Fagan's/Bradley's teaching you have absorbed. Within the last year I have learned from a Fagan AA article he noticed the importance of the faster moving t planets making partile 0,90,180 to natal planets on the day of the SLR, and I have verified this as most important with my limited research. But, I always felt since an outer planet t moved so slow it might not be that important making a partile 0,90,180 in the SLR on the day of the SLR. I know this: t Pluto is approaching a partile 180 to my Natal Mars, and I damn sure don't want to see this transits appear close to an angle in any of my upcoming SLRs---as a possibility for malefic 'outstanding' happenings. With my past, I have noticed Mars-Pluto symbolism manifesting in my life as being absolutely worn out with more physical activity than normal. Indeed, let us know if you see any Mars-Pluto symbolism manifesting in your life with your SLR. Thanks.

In other places, Fagan was clearer that he meant any partile transits. Also, re-read Chapter 6 of Bradkely's Solar and Lunar Returns: scattered through the chapter he makes some important individual statements (and many of them buried inside examples) His main statement in that chapter was:

Bradley wrote:Transits are most effective at the moment of lunar return, rather than at partile relationship to natal planets. In actual fieldwork with solunar charts, it is advisable at all times to note the aspective relationships of the planets in the return figure to those of the radix.

It resembles Fagan's strong statement (I'm not sure I agree with it as written, but I quote it) in a 1949 article I posted elsewhere on this site,

Fagan wrote: The only effective transits are those made on the dates of the Lunar returns.

(Take "on the date of the Lunar return" not literally but, rather, as meaning "in the Lunar Return.")

So far, the April 30 SLR is a hodge-podge of various things tripping over each other. I'm feeling the Sun to my Saturn a lot (as if everything weighs a ton more, psychologically more than physically), yet there is also getting new stuff (shopping) and other flurry around wedding plans that seems a mix of transiting Uranus on MC and my Jupiter-Uranus on EP.

New Demi-SLR about today, more on that laster. It has some very lovely things and a great deal of burden and strain as well.

If you strip out all but the closest factors, it starts to look very much like a wedding chart! (This is the lunar return in force until a coupe of hours after the wedding. This is also the interpretation most obvious of all the "life change" markers, though in reality there isn't much life change compared to most weddings.) But also with some struggles and difficulties.

I'm posting my next SLR early because I know that over the weekend and next week I'll have no time at all. In will occur in San Jacinto, CA at exactly 33N46'27", 117W00'18" on May 27, 2019, 8:22:22 PM PDT. My wedding will have culminated 2 hours 20 minutes earlier at 6:02 PM.

During the week following, I will not be home much (but some). After leaving San Jacinto (and spending less than a day home), we willbe in northern Santa Barbara County and southern San Luis Obispo County for a couple of days, then back to LA for two days, then I'll leave for Menlo Park (Silicon Valley) for a week.

Here is the breakdown for where the SLR occurs. At the very least it suggests one excellent and interesting party at which I am one of the centers of attention.

Back in LA, at home, Asc is 17°57' Scorpio, MC 2°27' Virgo. Roughly the same but Neptune slips into the foreground adding a Sun-Neptune mundane square foreground.

In Los Olivos (in north SB Co), Asc 16°07' Scorpio, MC 0°30' Virgo. Moon is now tightly angular (1°07'), Neptune a bit more in the mix (well, there will be a lot of wine!), Mercury slips out of the immediate foreground. Of particular interest to me is that on our two-day "winey-moon," SLR Descendant is 16° Taurus and Marion's Sun is 14° Taurus and Moon 16° Leo.

Just an hour further north in San Luis Obispo, similarly, Asc is 15°20' Scorpio (even closer to opposite Marion's Sun) and MC 29°54' Leo. Now Moon is 0°30' from IC and Sun nearly in the immediate foreground. One might anticipate that some of the most memorable passing events will occur there.

When I go to Menlo Park, Asc is 12°53' Scorpio, MC 28°15' Leo. Here, I'm really at the center of attention! Moon, squared by Jupiter, is 1°14' from IC, Sun 1°19' the other side of Descendant.

BTW, Marion's SSR occurs on this trip on May 30, 2019, 10:37:56 AM PDT. We have chosen a spot in Goleta, CA that places Uranus 0°00' from MC.The SSR almost anywhere in Southern California was going to have Uranus near MC and her natal Venus-Neptune square Ascendant. We decided that for the tone of year she wants, we need to concentrate on Uranus exactly angular for the actual SSR, then come home where the Venus-Neptune is in closer orb and the Uranus has backed off just a bit to be in balance with it.

There is a fascinating Mercury-Jupiter-Uranus T-square on "angles" in azimuth, i.e., Mercury mundanely on Antivertex opposite Jupiter mundanely on Vertex,both mundanely (PVP) square Uranus on MC.

Somewhere else, I remember reading that you said that there were no such thing as aspects to the angles *unless* those aspects actually represented other angles.

Would you mind clarifying which aspects to angles represent other angles? For instance, I'm assuming that a square to the Midheaven represents one of these other angles.

Also, I assume the orbs for such angles are relatively small...?

No more than 2°. And they aren't really squares to MC (that's just the easiest way to write it), i.e., being squares to the MC is not why they are valid. It's one of three ways to measure the Eastpoint axis.

I've spelled this out in most detail in Sidereal Mundane Astrology, Chapter 2, under the heading "Angularity." I suggest you read that whole section. For this particular angle, though, it refers to the literal eastpoint (also westpoint) of the horizon, the spot where the horizon and prime vertical intersect (also the celestial equator) due east (or west). The literal celestial longitude of that point - the zodiacal longitude you get when dropping a great circle through that point at right angles to the ecliptic - is the square to MC.

Similarly, ecliptical squares to Ascendant are the longitudes of Zenith and Nadir, the "straight up" and "straight down" intersections of the meridian and the prime vertical.

All of these minor angles take orbs of no more than 3°, with a significant strengthening if within 2°. However, for the ecliptical squares to MC I can't justify more than 2° total, either in casual observation or in statistical tallies.

As I'm typing the Firebrace letters, I am reminded of his great certainty that lunar returns (but not solar returns!) need to be done for birthplace, not residence (but with occasional input from residence angles). My experience disagrees with this adamantly (and he wouldn't have minded my saying so).

Nonetheless, out of respect and exploratory interest, I'll try to remember to also give my SLR birthplace angles for comparison. For the current (May 27) SLR, which occurred less than an hour and a half after the wedding (during the reception), these paint quite a different picture which does not seem to me to fit that night or the days since. (Had there been very strong Saturn for a couple of hurdles we had to manage, that would have made sense; but not Mars and the picture I see here.) Nonetheless...

The gist of it, then, is Venus, with my Mercury-Saturn involved in response. The Moon aspects seem to emphasize the tight Sun-Jupiter-Neptune, though it isn't clear how strong that will be - I'll need to watch the fortnight to see.

At the very least it suggests one excellent and interesting party at which I am one of the centers of attention.

Understand "I" as "we," this is quite accurate.

In Los Olivos (in north SB Co), Asc 16°07' Scorpio, MC 0°30' Virgo. Moon is now tightly angular (1°07'), Neptune a bit more in the mix (well, there will be a lot of wine!), Mercury slips out of the immediate foreground. Of particular interest to me is that on our two-day "winey-moon," SLR Descendant is 16° Taurus and Marion's Sun is 14° Taurus and Moon 16° Leo.

This got nipped to one day instead of two, and it was exactly as anticipated. No surprises. (We didnt get up to SLO, so the analysis forthere is irrelevant.)

When I go to Menlo Park, Asc is 12°53' Scorpio, MC 28°15' Leo. Here, I'm really at the center of attention! Moon, squared by Jupiter, is 1°14' from IC, Sun 1°19' the other side of Descendant.

The expectation (while fitting the planets) is overstated but the right type of interpretation. It went quite well, I was well received, had a successful week, and had a particularly enjoyable dinner one evening with a friend that I hadn't st down with in a while.

My new SLR occurred this morning at 4:21 AM PDT. It leans positive (which is quite useful since I'm now in the partile phase of Saturn's last square to my Sun). I'm not happy that there is a partile mundane Moon-Saturn square which is probably a valid factor - I guess we'll have the chance to find out this month.

This SLR, nearly half expired, is going along pretty much as expected. It's been a comfy, relaxed sort of Venus time in several ways (including, on 6/27, having a remarkable 2001 Grand Cru red Burgundy (a wedding gift) that was perfectly ready... shouldn't have gone another year so we didn't let it ).

The Saturn elements are there - whether Saturn's square to my Sun or the partile mundane Moon-Saturn square in the SLR itself. We gutted every spare nickle for the wedding (didn't mean to, but that's what it came to) and I'm still out of pocket for the week I traveled out of town for work (I'll get that back eventually). We borrowed from a private source right after the wedding and I expected to pay a chunk of it back this week, but we barely made rent, so... that's delayed. Not the end of the world, and we'll come out the other side, it's just not going to be fast. (Saturn to Sun is exact today. It will make the final direct pass in late November.)

This SLR has another two weeks to go, but there's a new Demi in a couple of days. I'll work that up this evening if I get the chance.

No natal planets are foreground, and the three foreground transiting planets are widely so. The main import seems to be the 0°10' foreground Jupiter-Neptune square (Moon's aspects serving primarily to intensify that aspect). Then there are the (not especially comfortable) partile aspects as backdrop. The main import of the chart, therefore, is something like this:

Jupiter-Neptune wrote:Unreasoned optimism (faith). Social idealism, cohesiveness. Disillusionment (misplaced optimism), exploitation, cheating (may become the victim of a swindle or tricked into a "sucker" agreement). Enthusiasm may soar to sublime heights, then amount to little. (Religious themes.)

In any case, this is the best SLR or Demi I have for the rest of the summer - maybe some hard blows before the summer is over. We'll see.

The Demi is about over (new SLR in a couple of days). The period has continued mostly low key and pleasant enough.

The biggest unexpected event was that our office building had a little-warning (day's notice) power shutdown, which always means I have to take down our servers and network ahead of it and bring it back up after (in this case, at 1 AM), plus lots of logistics around it. All went well (always a few glitches that we correct during the process). I don't think this shows in the main (angular) features of the chart (other than that things went well), but does show in the partile non-angular aspects of the Demi.

I also had my annual performance review, which fits the general tone of the SLR and Demi: Pleasant, routinely positive, nothing unusual or surprising about it.

The next SLR occurs Sunday, July 21, at 11:41:26 AM PDT. Not a lot happens in the chart (in the sense that no angularities are very close), though some aspects probably will stand-out, among which is an exact (middleground) Sun-Mercury conjunction exactly on my Jupiter-Uranus. Another that is noteworthy is an exact (middleground) Venus-Pluto opposition, perhaps of greater importance because Venus-Pluto is my closest natal aspect. The one foreground aspect is not my favorite, but the whole seems not overly tough and with some pleasant surprises along the way.

I went to see my ophthalmologist yesterday. There is a procedure to keep my right eye from worsening (the left is too far gone for the preventative procedure), originally scheduled in December, then he delayed it two or three times. Yesterday was the pre-op check.

The outcome is: Because of the delay one spot on the right cornea has progressed too far to make the procedure viable. It would have been viable in December and either halted worsening or slightly improved, and now we just watch the cornea gradually worsen over time.

Also while there, I lost my left hard contact - sitting right at the doctor's desk, taking them out. It popped and evidently bounced somewhere and, despite half an hour of looking, it wasn't found. (Hard to look when you don't have vision.) These cost $400-$500. At the moment, I have my in old lens (from a year earlier), it's about half as good and I think I probably need to stick with that rather than spend for a replacement.

So the theme of the day, from two directions, was definitely impaired vision. That, in turn, opened up those dark closets of the psyche I mentioned above.

But life moves on.

Or not moving on yet, since I'm still obsessing over the multiple mistakes the doctor's new assistant made yesterday. (Start down the path of grumble and it's grumble to the end of the road, eh?)

Yesterday wasn't what Id call horrible transits. Almost none, but the very slow, recently stationary Mercury squared my Neptune. Venus was barely in orb of conjunct my Uranus. I suspect it was the Mercury to Neptune behind all the hi-jinks.